Monday, 27 September 2004
it's not very often that even a Sunday broadsheet will carry an in-depth story about violence in the Niger Delta, so here's - cut and paste due to log-ins - an article from yesterday's Telegraph by Katharine Houreld in Port Harcourt.
incidentally here is the International Maritime Bureau's piracy centre.
On the widescreen television in front of me, Sylvester Stallone is fondling a semi-naked blonde. Sitting to my left on a sofa, staring at the screen, is Alhaji Dobuko Asari - a rebel leader and oil robber baron whose gang violence has turned Port Harcourt, Nigeria's oil-producing capital, into a war zone.
Asari, an Islamic convert who admires Osama bin Laden, has been denouncing the decadence of Western society but in truth his rhetoric is as passionless as Stallone's performance. Only the subject of oil rouses him.
His gang, the Niger Delta People's Volunteer Force, is among the rival armed militias who steal and smuggle oil from the pipelines criss-crossing the mangrove swamps in southern Nigeria.
The country is the sixth largest oil producer within Opec and its light, sweet, "bonny" crude is in high demand worldwide. The Nigerian government, however, estimates that £5.5 million-worth of its crude is tapped by the gangs each week, and sold to international grey marketeers.
In recent weeks, the oil supply has been further jeopardised by vicious fighting between the feuding militias. The government, fearing disruption to the lucrative trade, has retaliated with helicopter gunship attacks on the rebel camps. In all, an estimated 500 people have died in the internecine fighting in the past month alone.
After government troops were sent into Port Harcourt - traditionally a peaceful refuge - on Thursday, the oil giant Shell evacuated more than 250 non-essential members of staff from two facilities in the Niger Delta.
The company, which produces about half Nigeria's daily output of two million barrels of crude, said that output had not yet been affected. But Asari's men vowed to target wells and pipelines unless the government offensive was halted. The threat contributed to oil prices closing at a record high in New York on Friday of $48.88 a barrel.
"We are fighting the government for resource control," explains Asari, who trained in Libya. "The government steals the oil revenues and gives nothing to the people. We give something back, and that's why we have local support." Nigeria's oil revenues will top £15 billion this year but corruption has robbed the country of the money to develop. Life expectancy barely tops 50 and 70 per cent of the population survives on less than 55p a day. Gang membership provides a rare sense of motivation and employment for bored and frustrated youths. "It is like prohibition-era Chicago, except they are smuggling oil instead of alcohol," said one oil industry executive. "If this trend continues, the Niger Delta will be a war zone during elections."
Asari used to be an ally of the local state governor, Peter Odili, and still styles himself as a political leader. He claims that his purloined oil is sent to a crude refinery deep in the mangrove swamps of the Niger Delta and then sold off at a discount to poverty-stricken local people. While they live in rundown shacks around his militia camp, an hour's ride in a speedboat from Port Harcourt, the house in which we meet Asari has all the signs of warlord-luxe.
The camp is teeming with heavily armed men, but weapons are left at the door of the house. There is no running water, but the sitting-room boasts an aquarium of terrapins - the goldfish, Asari tells me, died of over-eating - a cocktail bar in the corner equipped with an extensive range of spirits, and a home cinema system with impressive surround-sound powered by a generator.
Throughout the interview, his six mobile telephones ring in sequence with a funky hip-hop ring tone: on the other end are state and military officials, calling to warn him of an impending government attack. "These are the people I went to school with," Asari explains. Local campaigners against the violence believe that the bonds are even stronger than childhood friendship. Asari's men have received funds from the local government, said one campaigner, Anyakwee Nsirimovu, and many militias originally had political backing.
"Many of the gangs were formed to intimidate political opposition during last year's elections," he said. "But once you give someone a gun, you cannot take it back. After the elections were won, the men turned to crime. The government created this monster and now they must control it."
Asari, who is in his forties, has two wives and six children but has not seen them since he fell out with Mr Odili last year and took up leadership of the volunteer force. The pair squabbled after Asari publicly criticised Nigeria"s president, Olusegun Obasanjo.
His men are polite, well-disciplined and - unusually for Nigeria - did not ask The Sunday Telegraph for money. His speedboat picked us up at a jetty after we had made contact on one of his mobile telephones. Asari does not drink, or allow drugs at any of his camps.
The camp's peaceful atmosphere is in contrast to the violence that has flared across the Niger Delta. Asari claims that helicopter gunships from the country's air force attacked three of his camps south of Port Harcourt last weekend, firing rockets at sites where they believed the militia leader was hiding.
In the fighting between the rival gangs, meanwhile, rockets, grenades and dynamite have been used to destroy ramshackle dwellings. One long-standing feud with a rival militia leader, "Godfather" Ateke Tom, who is said to be funded by the government, left seven dead in a restaurant massacre on September 1. Mr Odili responded by setting up a joint task force involving the navy, army and police, with orders to patrol the waterways 24 hours a day. Still, the violence has worsened.
Asari has responded to the air strikes on his militia camps by declaring 21 "days of rage" against rival gangs and the Rivers State government. Government spokesmen insist that the situation is under control, but residents report that their streets still echo to the sound of gunfire.
A recent report by the International Maritime Bureau says that the gang violence has already made the Niger Delta waterways the most deadly in the world. Further violence threatens to push the oil price - which is nudging towards record levels owing to unrest in the Middle East - even higher.
On the ground, some of the rebel fighters have lost their appetite for battle. "I came from Okrika [Ateke Tom's stronghold] before all this fighting began," said one young recruit. "I just want to go home." His prayers are not likely to be answered.
meanwhile, on Friday, it was reported that security forces had killed 27 militants in Nigeria's north-east.
over the weekend, the death toll may have been revised upwards/
incidentally here is the International Maritime Bureau's piracy centre.
On the widescreen television in front of me, Sylvester Stallone is fondling a semi-naked blonde. Sitting to my left on a sofa, staring at the screen, is Alhaji Dobuko Asari - a rebel leader and oil robber baron whose gang violence has turned Port Harcourt, Nigeria's oil-producing capital, into a war zone.
Asari, an Islamic convert who admires Osama bin Laden, has been denouncing the decadence of Western society but in truth his rhetoric is as passionless as Stallone's performance. Only the subject of oil rouses him.
His gang, the Niger Delta People's Volunteer Force, is among the rival armed militias who steal and smuggle oil from the pipelines criss-crossing the mangrove swamps in southern Nigeria.
The country is the sixth largest oil producer within Opec and its light, sweet, "bonny" crude is in high demand worldwide. The Nigerian government, however, estimates that £5.5 million-worth of its crude is tapped by the gangs each week, and sold to international grey marketeers.
In recent weeks, the oil supply has been further jeopardised by vicious fighting between the feuding militias. The government, fearing disruption to the lucrative trade, has retaliated with helicopter gunship attacks on the rebel camps. In all, an estimated 500 people have died in the internecine fighting in the past month alone.
After government troops were sent into Port Harcourt - traditionally a peaceful refuge - on Thursday, the oil giant Shell evacuated more than 250 non-essential members of staff from two facilities in the Niger Delta.
The company, which produces about half Nigeria's daily output of two million barrels of crude, said that output had not yet been affected. But Asari's men vowed to target wells and pipelines unless the government offensive was halted. The threat contributed to oil prices closing at a record high in New York on Friday of $48.88 a barrel.
"We are fighting the government for resource control," explains Asari, who trained in Libya. "The government steals the oil revenues and gives nothing to the people. We give something back, and that's why we have local support." Nigeria's oil revenues will top £15 billion this year but corruption has robbed the country of the money to develop. Life expectancy barely tops 50 and 70 per cent of the population survives on less than 55p a day. Gang membership provides a rare sense of motivation and employment for bored and frustrated youths. "It is like prohibition-era Chicago, except they are smuggling oil instead of alcohol," said one oil industry executive. "If this trend continues, the Niger Delta will be a war zone during elections."
Asari used to be an ally of the local state governor, Peter Odili, and still styles himself as a political leader. He claims that his purloined oil is sent to a crude refinery deep in the mangrove swamps of the Niger Delta and then sold off at a discount to poverty-stricken local people. While they live in rundown shacks around his militia camp, an hour's ride in a speedboat from Port Harcourt, the house in which we meet Asari has all the signs of warlord-luxe.
The camp is teeming with heavily armed men, but weapons are left at the door of the house. There is no running water, but the sitting-room boasts an aquarium of terrapins - the goldfish, Asari tells me, died of over-eating - a cocktail bar in the corner equipped with an extensive range of spirits, and a home cinema system with impressive surround-sound powered by a generator.
Throughout the interview, his six mobile telephones ring in sequence with a funky hip-hop ring tone: on the other end are state and military officials, calling to warn him of an impending government attack. "These are the people I went to school with," Asari explains. Local campaigners against the violence believe that the bonds are even stronger than childhood friendship. Asari's men have received funds from the local government, said one campaigner, Anyakwee Nsirimovu, and many militias originally had political backing.
"Many of the gangs were formed to intimidate political opposition during last year's elections," he said. "But once you give someone a gun, you cannot take it back. After the elections were won, the men turned to crime. The government created this monster and now they must control it."
Asari, who is in his forties, has two wives and six children but has not seen them since he fell out with Mr Odili last year and took up leadership of the volunteer force. The pair squabbled after Asari publicly criticised Nigeria"s president, Olusegun Obasanjo.
His men are polite, well-disciplined and - unusually for Nigeria - did not ask The Sunday Telegraph for money. His speedboat picked us up at a jetty after we had made contact on one of his mobile telephones. Asari does not drink, or allow drugs at any of his camps.
The camp's peaceful atmosphere is in contrast to the violence that has flared across the Niger Delta. Asari claims that helicopter gunships from the country's air force attacked three of his camps south of Port Harcourt last weekend, firing rockets at sites where they believed the militia leader was hiding.
In the fighting between the rival gangs, meanwhile, rockets, grenades and dynamite have been used to destroy ramshackle dwellings. One long-standing feud with a rival militia leader, "Godfather" Ateke Tom, who is said to be funded by the government, left seven dead in a restaurant massacre on September 1. Mr Odili responded by setting up a joint task force involving the navy, army and police, with orders to patrol the waterways 24 hours a day. Still, the violence has worsened.
Asari has responded to the air strikes on his militia camps by declaring 21 "days of rage" against rival gangs and the Rivers State government. Government spokesmen insist that the situation is under control, but residents report that their streets still echo to the sound of gunfire.
A recent report by the International Maritime Bureau says that the gang violence has already made the Niger Delta waterways the most deadly in the world. Further violence threatens to push the oil price - which is nudging towards record levels owing to unrest in the Middle East - even higher.
On the ground, some of the rebel fighters have lost their appetite for battle. "I came from Okrika [Ateke Tom's stronghold] before all this fighting began," said one young recruit. "I just want to go home." His prayers are not likely to be answered.
meanwhile, on Friday, it was reported that security forces had killed 27 militants in Nigeria's north-east.
over the weekend, the death toll may have been revised upwards/
Saturday, 25 September 2004
Ali Hamed, 91, does not understand why no one stopped the Janjaweed from driving him from the village he had not left for 80 years.
“I supported all people who have ruled Sudan since the English left, but this regime is full of criminals,” he said. “I hear there is a big government that can attack Omar Bashir. Can you ask them to come and help me?”
“I supported all people who have ruled Sudan since the English left, but this regime is full of criminals,” he said. “I hear there is a big government that can attack Omar Bashir. Can you ask them to come and help me?”
Thursday, 23 September 2004
Wednesday, 15 September 2004
Racism increasing in Europe: rising anti-Semitism, rising hostility towards Muslims, Gypsies discriminated against, asylum seekers beaten “for sport” in Scotland.
see more from the IHF-HR here.
see more from the IHF-HR here.
Tuesday, 14 September 2004
Jazz at Over The Top,
(78 Kingfield Road, Nether Edge, Sheffield)
(Buses 22 and 8, near Union Pub)
Thursday 16th September
8PM (prompt start)
Mick Beck Presents
A new Trio featuring
Pietro Lusvardi (double bass), Phil Marks (drums), and Mick Beck (tenor sax and bassoon).
Pietro Lusvardi is a Swiss-born, classically trained double bassist who is spending some time in England. He is well established in European and US West Coast jazz circles.
Phillip Marks and Mick Beck are better known in Sheffield as players of free music, but when they combined with two jazz players at the Lescar 18 months ago, their performances of jazz standards and original compositions was a great success. This is their first performance with Pietro (himself a composer).
Come and enjoy yourselves.
£5 waged, £3 unwaged.
For further information, phone Mick Beck on Sheffield 258 4999
(78 Kingfield Road, Nether Edge, Sheffield)
(Buses 22 and 8, near Union Pub)
Thursday 16th September
8PM (prompt start)
Mick Beck Presents
A new Trio featuring
Pietro Lusvardi (double bass), Phil Marks (drums), and Mick Beck (tenor sax and bassoon).
Pietro Lusvardi is a Swiss-born, classically trained double bassist who is spending some time in England. He is well established in European and US West Coast jazz circles.
Phillip Marks and Mick Beck are better known in Sheffield as players of free music, but when they combined with two jazz players at the Lescar 18 months ago, their performances of jazz standards and original compositions was a great success. This is their first performance with Pietro (himself a composer).
Come and enjoy yourselves.
£5 waged, £3 unwaged.
For further information, phone Mick Beck on Sheffield 258 4999
Monday, 13 September 2004
not one but two utter bits of gorgeousness at graun arts this morning that simply deserve a link.
firstly, Salgado photographs the Galápagos (i was lucky enough to catch his fine Exodus show [Barbican minisite], in tow with the l.c., at the glorious Chicago Cultural Center last year).
and, also, here's a piece on the Stirling prize nominees (Britain's foremost award for architecture).
i love the story about the Bexley school and the news that the Graz Kunsthaus is an art gallery (works of art inside that!) is just about enough to make one want to move to Graz. granted the relief on the building is a bit modish maybe but all told that's a wonderful design.
Cov's Phoenix Initiative looks quite sparkling too.
hopefully if (when?) the Gherkin wins it will gain some international recognition. i don't know about the global profile of 30 St Mary Axe but it seems finer than any new 'scrapers in, certainly, North America {OK, Asia's where it's at these days but still} and some acknowledgment would be nice (perhaps it is already internationally lauded and i am ignorant, but the green credentials of the building alone are quite cool)
firstly, Salgado photographs the Galápagos (i was lucky enough to catch his fine Exodus show [Barbican minisite], in tow with the l.c., at the glorious Chicago Cultural Center last year).
and, also, here's a piece on the Stirling prize nominees (Britain's foremost award for architecture).
i love the story about the Bexley school and the news that the Graz Kunsthaus is an art gallery (works of art inside that!) is just about enough to make one want to move to Graz. granted the relief on the building is a bit modish maybe but all told that's a wonderful design.
Cov's Phoenix Initiative looks quite sparkling too.
hopefully if (when?) the Gherkin wins it will gain some international recognition. i don't know about the global profile of 30 St Mary Axe but it seems finer than any new 'scrapers in, certainly, North America {OK, Asia's where it's at these days but still} and some acknowledgment would be nice (perhaps it is already internationally lauded and i am ignorant, but the green credentials of the building alone are quite cool)
my other blog's a Merc
started this a few weeks ago, following an off-the-cuff SR aside about the micro-scene (well Marcello and Todd B, anyhow) of blogs named for painters.
started solely for the awful title and as a possible space to make observations about food and drink, Publog style, i've only gone and forgotten the password so blogger may as well delete it now (the sidebar linkage is already inaccurate).
oh well oh well.
started this a few weeks ago, following an off-the-cuff SR aside about the micro-scene (well Marcello and Todd B, anyhow) of blogs named for painters.
started solely for the awful title and as a possible space to make observations about food and drink, Publog style, i've only gone and forgotten the password so blogger may as well delete it now (the sidebar linkage is already inaccurate).
oh well oh well.
Sunday, 12 September 2004
foolish and inadequate think piece in the local listing magazine, concerning a discussion of bling.
the ideas and concept behind the term are looked at, with the main thrust of the piece being an argument that many people would possibly buy into, that the exaggerated stance of the most rabidly bling is a turn off.
the garishness of bling now means there’s been a “hoodwinking” of bling, a move away from its origins, from its supposed genesis with “young, black British” (er, late 1990’s New Orleans, anybody?), to the stage where bling is in danger of ossifying into this rather vulgar house of cards.
this is a summary of the piece but right at the end there’s the bemoaning of bling being all aspirational signifiers (and doesn’t this contradict something written seconds earlier?).
given the article was clearly labelled as a think piece-type report, a missed opportunity to seriously debate the economics of this, perhaps?
the fashion pages of the magazine in question, incidentally, are usually rather quirkier alternative and TopShop retro, than urban, but perhaps that’s me being paranoid.
the ideas and concept behind the term are looked at, with the main thrust of the piece being an argument that many people would possibly buy into, that the exaggerated stance of the most rabidly bling is a turn off.
the garishness of bling now means there’s been a “hoodwinking” of bling, a move away from its origins, from its supposed genesis with “young, black British” (er, late 1990’s New Orleans, anybody?), to the stage where bling is in danger of ossifying into this rather vulgar house of cards.
this is a summary of the piece but right at the end there’s the bemoaning of bling being all aspirational signifiers (and doesn’t this contradict something written seconds earlier?).
given the article was clearly labelled as a think piece-type report, a missed opportunity to seriously debate the economics of this, perhaps?
the fashion pages of the magazine in question, incidentally, are usually rather quirkier alternative and TopShop retro, than urban, but perhaps that’s me being paranoid.
truly superb ‘Letter from Malabo’ [Equatorial Guinea] in a recent edition of the Eye.
their correspondent, rightly, has some harsh words for Riggs Bank of Washington, D.C., ExxonMobil, British law firm Penningtons (Henry Page from Penningtons is supposed to have said, absurdly, that suspects receive fair trials under Obiang’s vicious dictatorship) and, of course, Westminster.
There was only one European country to come out and declare our last election, won by Obiang supporters with the traditional 98 out of 100 seats, to have been free and fair. The same country flew out ballot boxes at the cost of tens of thousands of pounds.
Thanks be to the UK!
their correspondent, rightly, has some harsh words for Riggs Bank of Washington, D.C., ExxonMobil, British law firm Penningtons (Henry Page from Penningtons is supposed to have said, absurdly, that suspects receive fair trials under Obiang’s vicious dictatorship) and, of course, Westminster.
There was only one European country to come out and declare our last election, won by Obiang supporters with the traditional 98 out of 100 seats, to have been free and fair. The same country flew out ballot boxes at the cost of tens of thousands of pounds.
Thanks be to the UK!
interesting piece - under the heading The BBC is the IRA's useful idiot - from (angry Dublin scribe) Kevin Myers in today's Telegraph, reproduced in full below.
I watched BBC television's Silent Witness in weary disbelief last week. In it, our intrepid bone-sleuth Sam Ryan solved a 30-year-old double-murder in Northern Ireland. Needless to say, the secret killings were by RUC men. Better still, the killers had also murdered a colleague - as it happens, Sam's father, Sgt Ryan - because he was about to blow the whistle on them.
Naturally, there were all the improbabilities and implausibilities one might expect from a modern BBC fol-de-rol - for example, when the killers discovered that Sgt Ryan was on their trail, they instantly booby-trapped his car. Of course, day one in the RUC training-course: booby-trapping cars.
The mendacious fatuities of Silent Witness followed hard upon the comparable falsehoods of Waking the Dead, in which the Northern Ireland security forces had been similarly engaged in secret murder.
We really shouldn't be too surprised by anything the BBC does these days: the Dyke legacy has taken a terrible toll, and so there is no point in being angered by what we see on our screens. After all, it's only television, isn't it? Except it's not.
One of the central and abiding problems of Northern Ireland is the role of perception in influencing politics. For the BBC to be subsidising a Sinn Fein version of the history of the Troubles isn't merely wrong in itself, but is profoundly irresponsible, a kind of down payment on further conflict in the future.
Of course, Sinn Fein-IRA would welcome any unsought assistance from that useful idiot, the uncomplaining British licence-payer, and those even more useful idiots, television producers. What happens when Tarquin meets Jolyon in the BBC canteen and they decide to make a really riveting programme about Northern Ireland? Do they think about their duty to history, to the truth, and to the future? Apparently not.
They seem to think their obligation is merely to entertain, even if the result is a Sinn Fein-friendly confabulation which inverts the truth, dishonours the dead, and further adds to the lava-rock of Northern Ireland mythology. That the BBC showed two such programmes so close together suggests either that BBC controllers are not paying attention to what is being broadcast, or they simply don't care.
Northern Ireland was not Chile or Argentina. No one was murdered in custody by the security forces. No one. It just didn't happen. The only "disappeared" of the Irish Troubles were the dozen or so victims of the IRA, the remains of half of whom are still undiscovered. More than 300 RUC men and women were murdered by terrorists in the course of their duties: yet they held the line.
Their reward? Their force has been disbanded, while the IRA remains intact; and now RUC widows and orphans from a long and terrible ordeal must watch as Sinn Fein's propaganda assault on the bravest police force in Europe is reinforced by the BBC.
But, Jolyon and Tarquin might simper: it's only drama. My dears, nothing in Northern Ireland is ever "only"; everything has an impact, incrementally or otherwise. Moreover, how far would you sweeties be prepared to stretch the truth the other way? Would you have the IRA raping Protestant women or deliberately bombing Protestant schools? You squeal, of course not. Why not? Because such things never happened, you trill. Good. So why is it acceptable to tell comparable untruths about the RUC?
We have been here before. After the Troubles of 1916-22, a fictional narrative (as we now say) about those events was eagerly promulgated by Sinn Fein and assisted by the England-hating English Tarquins and Jolyons of their day. This work of fiction abolished IRA atrocities - the murders of alleged informers, of ex-servicemen, of Protestants, and the booby-trapping of dead bodies - and instead painted a picture of the Black and Tans as the sole villains of the time. This has become such a coercively powerful myth that it is now beyond all dissection or analysis.
By Kevin Myers
(Filed: 12/09/2004)
I watched BBC television's Silent Witness in weary disbelief last week. In it, our intrepid bone-sleuth Sam Ryan solved a 30-year-old double-murder in Northern Ireland. Needless to say, the secret killings were by RUC men. Better still, the killers had also murdered a colleague - as it happens, Sam's father, Sgt Ryan - because he was about to blow the whistle on them.
Naturally, there were all the improbabilities and implausibilities one might expect from a modern BBC fol-de-rol - for example, when the killers discovered that Sgt Ryan was on their trail, they instantly booby-trapped his car. Of course, day one in the RUC training-course: booby-trapping cars.
The mendacious fatuities of Silent Witness followed hard upon the comparable falsehoods of Waking the Dead, in which the Northern Ireland security forces had been similarly engaged in secret murder.
We really shouldn't be too surprised by anything the BBC does these days: the Dyke legacy has taken a terrible toll, and so there is no point in being angered by what we see on our screens. After all, it's only television, isn't it? Except it's not.
One of the central and abiding problems of Northern Ireland is the role of perception in influencing politics. For the BBC to be subsidising a Sinn Fein version of the history of the Troubles isn't merely wrong in itself, but is profoundly irresponsible, a kind of down payment on further conflict in the future.
Of course, Sinn Fein-IRA would welcome any unsought assistance from that useful idiot, the uncomplaining British licence-payer, and those even more useful idiots, television producers. What happens when Tarquin meets Jolyon in the BBC canteen and they decide to make a really riveting programme about Northern Ireland? Do they think about their duty to history, to the truth, and to the future? Apparently not.
They seem to think their obligation is merely to entertain, even if the result is a Sinn Fein-friendly confabulation which inverts the truth, dishonours the dead, and further adds to the lava-rock of Northern Ireland mythology. That the BBC showed two such programmes so close together suggests either that BBC controllers are not paying attention to what is being broadcast, or they simply don't care.
Northern Ireland was not Chile or Argentina. No one was murdered in custody by the security forces. No one. It just didn't happen. The only "disappeared" of the Irish Troubles were the dozen or so victims of the IRA, the remains of half of whom are still undiscovered. More than 300 RUC men and women were murdered by terrorists in the course of their duties: yet they held the line.
Their reward? Their force has been disbanded, while the IRA remains intact; and now RUC widows and orphans from a long and terrible ordeal must watch as Sinn Fein's propaganda assault on the bravest police force in Europe is reinforced by the BBC.
But, Jolyon and Tarquin might simper: it's only drama. My dears, nothing in Northern Ireland is ever "only"; everything has an impact, incrementally or otherwise. Moreover, how far would you sweeties be prepared to stretch the truth the other way? Would you have the IRA raping Protestant women or deliberately bombing Protestant schools? You squeal, of course not. Why not? Because such things never happened, you trill. Good. So why is it acceptable to tell comparable untruths about the RUC?
We have been here before. After the Troubles of 1916-22, a fictional narrative (as we now say) about those events was eagerly promulgated by Sinn Fein and assisted by the England-hating English Tarquins and Jolyons of their day. This work of fiction abolished IRA atrocities - the murders of alleged informers, of ex-servicemen, of Protestants, and the booby-trapping of dead bodies - and instead painted a picture of the Black and Tans as the sole villains of the time. This has become such a coercively powerful myth that it is now beyond all dissection or analysis.
By Kevin Myers
(Filed: 12/09/2004)
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